Gemma Ranford is studying for her doctorate in history. Having finished her course work, she now needs to work on her dissertation. Needing some new information to invigorate her research, she was ecstatic after hearing the details of a job that her advisor had recommended her for. Located in Edilean, Virginia, Mrs. Peregrine Frazier, an alma mater of the university, wanted someone to go through her family’s documents, catalogue them and write a history of the family. Mrs. Frazier had been the successful bidder at an auction of several hundred boxes of documents, even though the bidding had been fierce. The papers had been in the attic of a house in England, which had once belonged to the ancestors of the Fraziers who had been the earls of Ryphon, since the place was built around the time of Elizabeth the First. The competition for the job was fierce and had been narrowed down to three; Gemma and two others, Isla and Kirk. Since the other two were from society, Gemma feared that one of them would win the job, but she was determined to try her best to get her dream job, which included free housing on the family estate and would last for two years or more.

Colin Frazier is the Sheriff of Edilean. His father had been upset that none of his four sons or his daughter wanted to work at the family owned car lot. Colin had tried, but it had not taken long for everyone to see that he was not cut out for this type of work. While working there though, he had met Jane, a lawyer. They had broken up a few years ago. He refused to date any of his constituents in town, so when she started visiting him in Edilean again a year ago, he had let everyone in town believe that they were back together. He had recently purchased a house without telling anyone, not even his family or Jane, and he was looking for that special someone to share it with.

Arriving at the family estate, Gemma was thrilled when she saw the boxes of old documents and could not wait to go through them. So when given the choice of socializing with everyone or staying with the documents; she chose the documents. She later feared she had made the wrong choice and given her competitors a chance to charm Mrs. Frazier into giving one of them the job.

With so much to do, Colin had not been happy when his mother sent him to bring Gemma to the house for dinner, especially after meeting the other two job seekers. But from the first moment he saw her sitting on the floor amid the boxes of documents, he was charmed.

Delighted to be able to start going through the papers so soon, she had not been prepared to immediately find references to a Heartwishes Stone, a magical talisman which was said to grant wishes to anyone named Frazier. But she also knew that anything that powerful could cause harm to the family if it fell into the wrong hands. Still she felt that the whole thing was just a legend. That is, until she started spending more time with the family and found their secret wishes coming true.

As the whole town became enchanted with the subject, it came to the attention of many others that the stone was granting wishes…including the attention of an international thief. It was up to Colin to find him before someone got hurt. Spending more time with Colin, Gemma found herself falling in love with him. Working together, will they be able to find the stone before any harm befalls the family? Will their own secret wishes be fulfilled by the stone?

A magical story, HEARTWISHES, the latest book in gifted author Jude Deveraux’s EDILEAN series, is an intriguing contemporary romance, is one that readers will find hard to put down. I found myself either reading the book or thinking about reading the book, even after I arrived at the very satisfying conclusion. This was the first book in the EDILEAN series that I have read. I found that, despite being part of a series, it can be read as a standalone, but my fascination with the book also led me to seek out the other books in the series. Beautifully written and filled with engaging characters, a captivating plot, an international thief, betrayal, secrets, sensual situations, humor, clever repartee, true love and, of course, magic, HEARTWISHES is a story that will not soon be forgotten. This contemporary story is wonderfully wrapped around a historical story, that of the family and the stone itself. HEARTWISHES is a story you will not want to miss and is definitely a keeper. As I get wrapped up in the other books of this series, be sure to get your own copy of HEARTWISHES.